


Not in that way.

by M3H



Category: HKT48
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-22
Updated: 2017-06-22
Packaged: 2018-11-17 09:08:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,805
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11272356
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/M3H/pseuds/M3H





	Not in that way.

Haruka was sitting on her wheelchair out on the balcony. Rain was pouring down her face and her whole body, mingling with her own tears and sweat.  
She was sweating, but it was cold. 2°C they said at the TV, with a strong wind and 76% chance of rain. She had looked at the sky outside, already full of dark, grey clouds; silly, she had thought, there definitely was at least 20% more chance of rain.  
The A/C had kept her warm inside somebody else’s  bedroom. And that warmth and those unfamiliar walls suddenly had made her feel like a caged animal. She felt like suffocating in her orthopedic corset, the wheelchair felt more paralyzing than ever, and soon she started cold sweating. She had looked outside the window once more: the wind was indeed strong and rain had already started pouring. She had smiled at herself for a moment – maybe the meteorologist career could be an option in the future, too.  
She had driven herself to the balcony window, opened it and proceeded forward; tears had began falling down her cheeks immediately. 

The world outside was chaotic and loud and fast and alive, and Haruka had no idea how much she had missed it. She had locked herself inside somebody else’s apartment for four days, feeling like time had stopped, crippling and weakening and chaining her to a stone that was slowly and constantly dragging her to the bottom of an ocean called helplessness. The smells and the noises reminded her of a busy Tokyo she used to meet with a big smile and dreamy eyes every morning at 5. And despite sometimes waking up was a living hell – because sleeping was the third thing she loved the most in the world – she quickly found her usual enthusiasm and cheerfulness sometime between breakfast and a shower. And that was because she loved her job. She loved to be able to perform every day, singing and dancing, even though she might’ve not been the best at neither of them. She loved to meet new people, talk to them, share opinions and impressions over all kind of topics and common interests. She loved to make new friends in the work environment, she loved to give advice to her juniors and to receive advice from her seniors. She simply loved to be around people, and she loved to be an idol. 

She loved all those things she probably wasn’t going to be able to do anymore. 

With clenched teeth and puffy eyes, Haruka slowly stood up from her seat. Her spine immediately felt like being stabbed by a thousand knives, and her arms and her legs fell weak to the excruciating pain. She leaned against the balcony railing, grabbing it as strong as her fists let her, staying up for as long as her feet carried her. She screamed and she cried and she screamed again, in pain and exhaustion and misery. She screamed, until she wasn’t anymore. Now, she was laying on the floor. It was wet and cold and hard at the touch with her back. And slippery. That’s right. She slipped, and it happened all so fast and tragic that her brain struggled to even register it.  

The sky looked even more unreachable from that angle, or so she thought. And the rain was now blinding her, falling down straight like arrows.  She turned to her left, glancing at her wheeled cage; she hated that machine so much. She began dragging herself towards it, and every strain felt like breaking bones down her spine, sending acute pain throughout her whole body. Her nightdress was soaked wet and she was cold and she was miserable. She desperately attempted to pull herself up in the wheelchair, but she failed. She tried again, and she failed again. She cursed and she cried, and she pushed the machine away from her, as to make it fall, as to reject it. But her arms were so weak and her body was so aching, it only moved so slightly; as to fight her, as to mock her. 

Then, she heard the front door opening and then closing. And her heart took a dip in her stomach only to surface in her throat, and her brain went blank, and for a moment or two she forgot how to breathe. The house owner was back. And as always, the very first thing she did after stepping inside the house was checking on Haruka. And that’s why she was still wearing her coat when she rushed to help her sitting back on her wheelchair, after finding her out on the balcony looking like a mess.  She gave it to her to keep her warm after pulling her back into the house and closing the balcony window. 

“What happened?!” she asked alarmed. A strongly concerned look in her eyes.  
She had stepped outside that balcony only for a few seconds, but the rain still caught her. Her bangs was all messy and wet, and yet Haruka thought she looked beautiful.  
  
“I fell.” she simply conceded, her eyes laying everywhere but on the other girl’s.  

“Yeah, I _saw_ that, but why?” she kept pushing. “Did you try to stand up on your own? And out on the balcony, of all places!?”  
  
Regrettingly: a moment of silence. “Why do you care?” Haruka asked. She could hear the apprehension in the other’s tone, and it made her feel so uncomfortable and pathetic and a fool. But also _fooled_ by her.  
  
“Why do _I_ care? Are you serious right now!?”

  
“Are _you_ serious?” her tone was harsh, hurt. Her body was still in agony, but this was a whole different kind of pain that was arising from her chest and aiming for her heart only. She’d learned to recognize it very well, and she knew the other woman did too, although she probably had no idea what it felt like.  
  
Her hostess let out a sigh as a response and then began pushing her towards the bathroom. Haruka figured she was going to give her some towels to dry up, but she was wrong.

“What are you doing?” She asked, when the other turned on the shower. 

“You’re soaked wet. You need a shower,” she explained, taking her own coat off of Haruka’s shoulders. 

“I’m not taking a shower.“  
  
“I’m not letting you fall ill because of your stubbornness!”  
  
“Don’t you unders _h_ tand!? I _can’t_ take a shower! My arms _h_ are so weak I can’t even lift them!” 

Her ribcage felt on fire. There was anger mixed with hunger, desire mixed with denial, sentiment mixed with resentment and self-deprecation mixed with self-preservation. She was burning and she was cold and she was craving for things she couldn’t have. Freedom. And Love.

“Fine then, take off your clothes. I’ll wash you.” 

Bewilderment.  
Haruka stared at the other in silence, searching for the hint of a joke, or humor, or anything that could prove her that the woman standing before her, whose eyes were piercing through her very skin, was just very poorly messing around.

“Are you high?” Haruka asked, perhaps even too seriously.

“ _Excuse_ me?” 

“You’re either high, or drunk, or just _too stupid_ to realize that such jokes aren’t funny _at all_. Leave me alone, Sakura. I’m not taking a fr _y_ eaking shower!” 

“Fine.” Sakura decided, falling on her knees and unbuttoning the other’s nightdress. 

Haruka’s arms _were_ too weak to be lifted. When she told Sakura that, she wasn’t lying. In fact, every single limb and inch of her body was in pain. So when she saw herself _slapping_ Sakura in the face, quickly, sharply, almost as though she was out of her own body and witnessing someone else doing it, the shock hit her first like a train.

“ _Shit,_ I’m sor—“

“You know what? _Go to hell_ , Haruka.” Sakura stood up, one hand on the sore cheek, her eyes watery, “Just because I don’t feel the same _towards you_ it doesn’t mean you’ve got the right to treat me like shit, okay!?” 

The fire in her chest had momentarily extinguished only to be replaced by a dagger with the word HUMILIATIONcarved on it. Which began stabbing her at almost every word Sakura spoke.

“I’m trying _my_ _very best_ to be supportive. I’m hosting you in my apartment, I’m taking care of you, I _do_ care about you, and I want you to recover soon! That’s why I don’t want you to also add a fever to your current condition!”  
  
Haruka wondered for a moment if it were possible for her to fall into the floor, or become invisible, or just vanish into thin air…

“And yet, it looks like the more I try to help _you_ , the more you hate _me_. And I’m sorry, I really am, but I can’t force myself to _love you_. Not in _that way_!”

…or simply die. 

“So you better deal with it soon enough, or I’m going to ask the manager to take you someplace else. Because, I know it might sound _crazy_ , but I have a heart too. And it _bleeds_ , just like yours. You’re not the only one that gets hurt here. You’re not. And your dagger is just as sharp as mine.” 

And just like that, Sakura grabbed her own coat and stormed out of the room.  
  
Haruka stayed there, staring at the ceiling, silently crying, and thinking.  
Three weeks ago she was filming for a new AKS produced drama called Tofu Pro-Wrestling. Having already had a back injury in the past, the doctors had told her not to do extreme efforts or movements. She had also told the staff and management, who assured her that they were going to take all necessary precautions.  
Clearly, they _lied_.  
Shimada’s wrestling character had this move that consisted in taking the opponent by the legs and spinning for five or six times until she threw them on the other side of the ring. And despite the staff had told Haruka that the ring floor was soft enough that it wasn’t going to cause her spine any kind of damage, the moment after they tried the move for the first time, her back began aching. It wasn’t anything unbearable, just a slight pain, and because she is the stubborn idiot she is, she didn’t tell anything to anybody. She just started taking a bunch of pills to make the pain go away and kept showing up at shootings.  
Ten days later the pain seemed gone so she stopped taking the pills. Few days later, while meeting fans at a handshake event, her spine began aching to the point she nearly fainted. She couldn’t move, she couldn’t even _speak_ for how painful it was. And after spending a couple of nights at the hospital, anesthetized, the third day the doctors told her she had to start physiotherapy. Her mom and dad took care of her at her own apartment in Tokyo for the following few days, but because they both had jobs they had to attend to, they left for their hometown on the seventeenth day. That’s when her manager thought to ask Sakura to host her.

Terrible idea. 

Haruka was in love with her. And if you asked her, she’d tell you she fell in love with Sakura right away, the moment their eyes met because, the truth is, she didn’t even recall when exactly she started feeling different towards the other girl. If it was after their conversation in Sakura’s hotel room when they both had the center-position stolen from under their noses by a second generation newbie, in which they cried and cried and told each other words of support and Haruka could swear that, for the first time in her entire life, she finally felt _seen_ and understood by somebody to the very core; if it was after they moved Sakura to the new established Team KIV and she felt like they had cut out a piece of her own heart and thrown it to hungry dogs; or if it was when Sashihara asked both her and Sakura to kiss in front of a more than fifty thousand people audience during a concert. And she felt suddenly awkward and embarrassed and confused, but also weirdly excited and happy and actually _grateful_ to Sashihara. And then she looked at Sakura, and she was embarrassed too, and she was beautiful and she was funny, and then Haruka wondered if she should’ve kissed her first in order not to make her feel uncomfortable. She didn’t want her to feel uncomfortable. And then she glanced at her lips and they looked soft and warm and _tasty_ , and so she leaned in and kissed her. And in a moment, in the fragment of a moment, the fifty thousand people audience vanished, as well as all the other members that were looking at them, waiting impatiently, and it was only the two of them. It was only Haruka’s heart, pounding and exploding like fireworks in the summer sky, and then blooming back to life like flowers in spring, and Sakura’s heart. And they were kissing, and Sakura’s lips _were_ soft and warm _and_ tasty . Like all different kinds of food Haruka would love to try in the world because eating is her second favorite thing in the world kind-of-tasty.  And they were kissing, and for a moment, Haruka could swear Sakura was kissing her back. Before she pulled away. Before _Sakura_ pulled away. And everyone else were laughing and cheering, and Haruka looked at Sakura and Sakura _knew._   

Haruka was in love with her and Sakura knew it. But, _she didn’t feel the same_. And now they were forced to live under the same roof and pretend it wasn’t the most awkward and inconvenient thing in the world. And Haruka couldn’t help it but acting like a bitch because her whole body and heart were in indescribable _pain_ and she didn’t know how to make it stop. The doctors told her it was going to take some time before physiotherapy made effect, but even _if_ that were true, even _if_ eventually her body stopped aching, what about her heart? What about the nights spent crying before finally falling asleep because Sakura had to work until late with other members and she felt jealous and she wanted to be with her so badly? What about her _feelings_? 

Her train of thoughts was abruptly interrupted by the door opening. She quickly raised her arm to wipe away the tears, but the sudden strain caused her to whine. Haruka was only now noticing that Sakura had left the shower on, and because of the steam that it formed, it took her a few seconds to recognize the little, round shadow that started rubbing against her feet. 

“Hey you. What are you doing here?” 

“He wanted to check on you.”  Sakura spoke up from the doorstep, and Haruka froze. She made her way through the room and turned off the shower, and Haruka wondered if she had left it on, hoping for her to jump in it like she currently wasn’t the most pathetic of creatures, or if she really forgot to turn it off. Which wouldn’t have been much like her.  Because she was the clumsy, absent-minded one, not Sakura. Sakura pretended to be. Sakura was way too clever and attentive for that. 

The girl stood there, and Haruka could feel her eyes on her. But she didn’t look up, she kept her own on Maru-chan, the cat. She knew the other was waiting for her apologies, and she knew she had all the rights to. But the more she tried to look up the more the fear of rejection and judgment and criticism and hatred tied her eyes to the cat. And her chest was on fire again, and she was burning again, and she wanted to be brave and strong and decent to the person who more than anyone else was looking over her and taking care of her, even more than her own parents, but she couldn’t. She simply couldn’t. 

“Maru-chan, let’s go. Let’s give her some more time alone,” again, Sakura broke the silence. She picked up the fur-ball and headed for the door. “Call me if you need anything.” 

“I’m sorry!” she threw up the words. And she was feeling lighter, but also sicker.

They were met with silence, but Sakura was there. Glancing at her back. 

“I’m sorry.” she threw up again, her heart racing, her hands shaking, her lungs turning ashes for how much they were burning. “I’m sorry.” This time, a whisper. A sob, but without tears. Perhaps there were none left, she thought. Perhaps her eyes had finally become dry and she had no more tears to shed. Not too bad, right? _Not too bad._

She felt a hand touching her shoulder, then her arm, then her hands - gently, tenderly – and Sakura was back on her knees, facing her. Maru-chan nowhere to be seen, and their eyes burning into each other. “It’s okay.” she said in a whisper. “I just want you to heal…”  
And in that moment, all the tears Haruka no longer had to shed were running down Sakura’s own face. Silently, slowly. Beautifully, painfully. And Haruka wanted to kiss them away, and vow her that she was never going to hurt her again. But she knew herself, and she knew how she felt, and she knew her condition, and she didn’t want to lie. 

Sakura wiped her own tears away. Then a smile, “You’re still soaked wet. Are you going to slap me again?”

And Haruka knew that Sakura already had the answer, but she still slightly shook her head in response. And so she began unbuttoning her nightdress once more, without ever breaking eye contact with her, but Haruka’s eyes would too often fall on her lips, linger there, crave them, while the arousal became stronger every loosen button.  
The orthopedic corset came after that, leaving her completely naked. 

Sakura embraced her, wrapping her own arms around her back, slowly lifting her up from the wheelchair. Their bodies were touching, rubbing against each other. And it was painful, and it was humiliating, but it also was hot and pleasant and the closest Haruka was ever going to get to her. So she compromised with herself and decided to focus on the bright side, for once.  
  
The shower had a small stool in the middle, which Sakura put in there after Haruka had moved in. She put her down, carefully. Then turned the shower back on and began washing her back. Her touch was gentle and soft, and the water was running, and Haruka could see her getting wet, and she could smell her shampoo, and she wondered if she was going to smell like her now.  
When she was done, Sakura asked her if she wanted her to also wash her front body, but Haruka figured it wasn’t going to be too hard for her to do it by herself. And she was right. 

Sakura wrapped a towel around her, then, and began drying her up. And Haruka stared at her, begging to know what she was thinking. She could clearly see the pink bra she was wearing showing from under her shirt, and she was soaked wet and she looked ridiculously beautiful. So she dared, and timidly cupped the cheek she had hit earlier with her hand.  And she slowly leaned closer. 

“Haruka…” Sakura let out in a whisper, as to warn her, but she didn’t move. She kept still, her eyes fixed on hers. 

“Stop me.” 

She actually _begged_ her to. It was a cry for help. Because she knew her, she knew Sakura, and she knew that she wasn’t going to pull away. Because she knew Sakura cared for her and she wanted her to be happy and she knew how miserable and hopeless she had been feeling, and she was going to do anything in order to make her feel better, even _that_. Even kissing someone she didn’t have feelings for. Because she knew that Haruka actually also _wanted_ to kiss her. And that the paradox that she had always been once more was showing, and once more, Sakura was the one who was going to be blamed for anything that was going to happen next. Because she knew that whatever decision she was going to take, it was going to hurt Haruka anyway. Because the one thing that Haruka wanted, the one thing that Haruka truly needed, other than being free of walking and working as she used to, was _her_. She wanted her, she wanted her love. Because that was the number one thing she loved the most in the world; Sakura. The one person that could make her smile and laugh, and cry and weep like nobody else could. She wanted to be with her, living in the world and experiencing all sort of things _with her_ ; challenges, achievements, failures, harsh moments, happy moments, joy and sorrow, all of them. She wanted to share her life with her, because being with her was the only thing that truly made her feel happy and complete.  And it might’ve been selfish, and it might’ve been wrong, but Haruka had been fighting over those feelings and that side of herself for so long, she just wanted _to feel joy_. 

And Sakura knew it. And Sakura didn’t move. 

She let her kiss her, and she kissed her back. Embracing her, accepting her, welcoming her and all the weight of rejection and pain she’d been carrying with her. And Haruka felt that, she felt the acceptance and the warmth and the affection… But she didn’t feel the _love_. Rather, she did feel that, but not her own same kind. And so the tears were back, and her kiss became a little rougher, and her hand travelled down Sakura’s jugular while the other made its way up her shoulder. She was naked and she wanted Sakura to be naked too. She wanted her to be as fragile and exposed as she was. And if she couldn’t love her, she wanted her to hate her. She wanted her to hate her and stop pitying her. She wanted her to hate her and stop acknowledging her. She wanted her to hate her and stop loving her in a way that was _never_ going to be enough. 

And then she pulled away. _Haruka_ pulled away. And she cried. And her spine was still aching, and her heart was still pounding, but the fire in her chest died, leaving only ashes behind. Because, it didn’t matter how hard she tried, or hoped, or begged, it was something she had to accept; that Sakura was never, _ever_ going to love her back. 


End file.
